An effect of perpendicular diffusion on the anisotropy of solar energetic particles from unconnected sources

Abstract

Recently, Tan and coworkers studied the 2001 September 24 solar energetic particle (SEP) event observed by the Wind spacecraft at 1AU and found that there is a counter-streaming particle beam with a deep depression of flux at 90° pitch angle during the beginning of the event. They suggested that it is a result of a reflecting boundary at some distance outside of 1AU. While this scenario could be true under some specific configuration of an interplanetary magnetic field, in this paper we offer another possible explanation. We simulated the SEP event by solving the five-dimensional focused transport equation numerically for 40keV electrons with perpendicular diffusion. We find that a counter-streaming particle beam with deep depression at 90° pitch angle can form on Parker magnetic field lines that do not directly connect to the main particle source on the Sun in the beginning of an SEP event. It can happen when a significant number of observed particles come from adjacent field lines through parallel transport to large radial distance first, hopping across field lines through perpendicular diffusion, and then getting scattered back to 1AU, where they combine with the particles directly coming from the Sun to form a counter-streaming beam. © 2011. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.